10 JOUBNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL SIST, SOCIETY, Vol. XXVll. 



essentially birds of thick cover, and will never be found on the 

 open bare lands so common in parts of Travancore, nor indeed 

 will they often be found in scrub or thick grass, though they 

 frequent the dense patches of Lantana bush in the mornings and 

 evenings, greedily eating the berries and the white ants- -or 

 termites — which are as plentiful as the berries. 



Their home is in the depths of evergreen Jungle, and less often 

 in heavy bamboo jungle, and here, as one wanders gun in hand, 

 they may often be heard rustling about amongst the fallen leaves, 

 a habit which has bestowed upon them the Tamil name of Saravoo 

 Koli or Dry-leaves Fowl. 



Less often than they are heard they may be seen scuttling across 

 some more open glade or forest path, and a hasty snap shot obtains 

 a dinner worthy of an epicure. If put up by dogs, they invariably 

 take to trees, and if so treed it is then easy to pot them as they 

 sit. They are poor flyers, though like many others who are poor 

 performers, they are very noisy, making a great fluster in rising, 

 and a loud whirr as they fly. 



Mr. J . Stewart, to whom I owe the foregoing notes, says that 

 he has never attempt- d to make a bag of Spur-Fowl, but has 

 several times got 4 or 5 in a morning's or evening's walk. They 

 were most often met with when one was after big game, and in 

 conseqi^ence escaped without being fired at. 



When disturbed, the}^ utter a chattering cry, and after a pair 

 or a family have been put up and separated, they continue to call to 

 one another until all have been reunited. 



The cocks are not noisy birds, but crow, ifone can call their chuck- 

 ling cry a crow, regulai-ly in the mornings and evenings during the 

 breeding season. One would have expected birds so well armed 

 with weapons of ojEfence to be exceptionally combative, but I can 

 find no support for such an idea, and Mr. Stewart informs me that 

 he has never come across them fighting or obtained any evidence, 

 native or otherwise, to make him think they are at all pugilistic by 

 nature. 



They are difiicult birds to rear, and Mr. Stewart never succeeded 

 in bringing them up. His most successful attempt was with some 

 birds which grew half-way to maturity, and then all died after 

 their first meal of paddy, a food substituted too suddenly for their 

 previous diet of white ants. 



They have, however, been reared in the Trevandrum Zoological 

 Gardens, where they lived in amity with some Grey Jungle-Fowl. 



They feed on a mixed diet of insects, fruit and grain, and in the 

 mornings and evenings are very fond of scratching about and feeding 

 in the intensely thick secondary growth which so soon covers the 

 deserted cofiee clearings. They do not, however, ever haunt the 

 more open coffee which is being cultivated. 



